{"id":8941,"date":"2011-10-21T05:31:57","date_gmt":"2011-10-21T04:31:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.pyranha.com\/blog\/?p=8941"},"modified":"2011-10-21T05:31:57","modified_gmt":"2011-10-21T04:31:57","slug":"grand-canyon-solo","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.pyranha.com\/blog\/grand-canyon-solo\/","title":{"rendered":"Grand Canyon Solo"},"content":{"rendered":"

“Never<\/span>, pass up a trip on the Grand.”\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n

All the mantras often parroted when the topic of the Grand\u00c2\u00a0surfaces in conversation can certainly bore those of us who had never been down.\u00c2\u00a0 Yeah I totally get it, sounds awesome.\u00c2\u00a0 Three week desert run with incredible scenery, history, rapids and the opportunity to sit on\u00c2\u00a0a groover and be amazed how everyone\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s poop always looks exactly the same.\u00c2\u00a0 A dream come true.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n

“Will you take me?”\u00c2\u00a0 “No”\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n

Will they show you pictures and tell you how cool it is?\u00c2\u00a0 Yes.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

I personally did not put it too high on my list.\u00c2\u00a0 Not that I didn’t think it could be the coolest river I had ever run, but well I can’t really give a good explanation.\u00c2\u00a0 It just wasn’t high.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n

That was true until this past February droning away\u00c2\u00a0in\u00c2\u00a0Kamloops, BC\u00c2\u00a0where all things kayaking are just out of reach that time of year, and then the itch struck.\u00c2\u00a0 In an excited frenzy I emailed family and friends to enter in the upcoming lottery.\u00c2\u00a0 Out of the 30 or so folks I blasted 5 times with over-excited miss placed gerunds and run-on sentences, only one friend I was actually with at the time entered.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n

We each won a launch date and after forfeiting one we\u00c2\u00a0settled on Nov 2012.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n

And that was it; I put it in my head and went on with school and figuring out summer work.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n

Fast forward to Sept 16th<\/sup>, a cold Montana rain surrounded a manufactured home in the remote shields valley bounded by the Crazy, Bridger and Absorka mountain ranges.\u00c2\u00a0 It’s mid Sept and I’m not stoked to gather firewood for Barb with my buddy Corey.\u00c2\u00a0 Instead we bake a pie and watch random TV, things we haven’t done in months.\u00c2\u00a0 Sometime around\u00c2\u00a0that afternoon\u00c2\u00a0is when my inbox received a quite intriguing email.\u00c2\u00a0 I excited read it aloud to Corey.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n

“It says their web site is having troubles and they are doing a first come first serve call in system for canceled Grand permits!”<\/p>\n

By the time I got through, the original cornucopia of 30+ launch dates had been whittled down to only 2.\u00c2\u00a0 When Elysha the friendly Ranger related the news I wasn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t all too bummed.\u00c2\u00a0 I could have only gone on Sept 19th<\/sup> because my brother was soon to be married the first of October, quickly followed by a kayak trip to Nepal. \u00c2\u00a0Therefore I couldn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t find a single other person to come along and help split the gas costs.\u00c2\u00a0 I really wanted to go, but this was probably just fate helping me make a responsible choice.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u00e2\u20ac\u0153Oh that\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s alright Elysha thanks, well what are the dates?\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n

\u00e2\u20ac\u0153Sept 19th<\/sup>, and yaddi yaddi yadda\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n

Whohoo, Grand Canyon here I come!!<\/p>\n

Perhaps it was the long drive but I slept surprising well despite the excitement and awoke in the morning to a beautiful river slowly moving past the many commercial boats ready to launch.\u00c2\u00a0 There was only one other non-commercial party putting on that morning.\u00c2\u00a0 Mike Coultrain gave us a warm send off after his enjoyable river speech.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n

As speed was of importance I hurried into the clear water and was off!\u00c2\u00a0 Immediately a side tributary spilled in muddying up the water.\u00c2\u00a0 Now with a much more natural brown coloration to the body of water below me I fell into a rhythm for the rest of the day stopping for bed 50 miles further downstream.\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n

And so here is the interesting thing about the Grand.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n

It is most definitely worth all the hype.\u00c2\u00a0 I totally didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t buy it at first. \u00c2\u00a0Even the first 10 miles drifting comfortably in my boat absolutely enveloped in the beauty of the canyon which grew by the moment but it was still similar to other runs.\u00c2\u00a0 I figured \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Ok, so this is like Cataract, which is incredibly awesome and I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m loving it but no different except hundreds of miles long!\u00c2\u00a0 So that must be the cool part, the duration of the trip.\u00c2\u00a0 Something hard to come by these days of reservoirs and dams.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n

But then something crazy happened.\u00c2\u00a0 It was as if I was the audience to a fantastic high school play.\u00c2\u00a0 The best to ever be, with young teen prodigies twirling and singing about.\u00c2\u00a0 Then all of a sudden Broadway in all its larger than life glamour and over the top lusty extravagance reared up slapping me in the face.\u00c2\u00a0 Lights glared burning my retinas, the acoustic glory placed drums beating in my chest and there might have been explosions, it kinda hurt.\u00c2\u00a0 I was impressed.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n

Next time the Grand comes up in conversation and someone tells you how incredible it is and that you need to go.\u00c2\u00a0 Believe them; it totally lives up to all the hype.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n

Now would you like to see some pictures while I tell you how cool it is?\u00c2\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00c2\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00c2\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\"IMG_1222\"<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

\"IMG_1239\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Amoung a few silly items they actually\u00c2\u00a0require a second life jacket, even if your by yourself!\u00c2\u00a0 It didn’t end up fitting in the boat so I left it.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"IMG_1258\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Not a very inspiring first sight of the river.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"IMG_1302\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\"IMG_1417\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Little Colorado joining the main for an enhanced river coloring.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\"IMG_1239\"<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":198,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8941","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-paddler-lifestyle-articles"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p9tk9G-2kd","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pyranha.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8941","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pyranha.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pyranha.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pyranha.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/198"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pyranha.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8941"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.pyranha.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8941\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pyranha.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8941"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pyranha.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8941"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pyranha.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8941"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}